A blog about all kinds of vintage technology from simple mechanisms of the late 1800s through electronics and robotics of the 1980s. Many posts will be typecast and some will be off topic bits from everyday life. The blog will wander and meander with my quasi-evolving and ever changing interests.

Monday, January 18, 2016

IBM Electromatic Sighting

I had to share this beast seen in the wilds of an antique mall. Other than a stuck "z", it appears to work fine and badly needs a new power cord. It wheezes and chugs and smells vaguely of ozone with its open armature motor design. Unfortunately, I could not find a serial number to accurately date it.

The typeface is a simplified sans in all caps. It didn't appear to be a Ham mill. Such an interesting machine, but I have no space for it.

I keep seeing silly descriptions for old machines. They are all steampunk. I would be interested in seeing this with all of the sheet metal removed. Below is the closest thing I could find to a serial number. The motor was serviced in the 1950s. Again, such an interesting critter. Must resist...

Oooh, another one! My father used to sell typewriters for IBM. We found one of these monster machines in my late aunts' storage. I did a little research -- see this blog post of mine that includes pics of it: http://danteswardrobe.blogspot.com/2012/03/it-was-dark-and-stormy-typewriter.html

Unfortunately the link posted there to the PDF of the service manual is broken, but it you check The Google using this search string "IBM Model 01 electric typewriter service manual" you'll find 2 different manuals.

Really reasonable at $40. That made leaving it behind all the harder, but I don't even have space to keep my IBM Executive out in the open. Sad - the innards on this machine were really beautiful bits of engineering.